Flex Credit--Multiple

            Before Brain Gillis’s presentation, once someone mentioning multiple, my first reaction is mathematics, and I never have thought that this abstract words would have relationship with art. Like Brain said in class, the multiple in art is similar to the multiple in mathematics, they are all containing more than once, or more than one, consisting of more than one, manifold, repeated many times, having several, or many parts. Like all other presentations came to class this term, drawing, digital media, fibers, sculpting, art&environment, those media of art all are from our daily life and ignored by our eyes.

 In the lecture, which one attracted me most is the Marcel Duchamp, one reason is we learned his famous ‘Fountain’ earlier, and the other reason is his work is awash with multiple personalities. Like his art work—‘Bicycle Wheels’, which was readymade art object. In this picture, it is a sweet and goofy construction: a bicycle wheel and fork mounted upside-down on a tall stool. Many aspects of a bike lend themselves to wonder and introspection—everything from the double-triangle frame designing to the bearing and races in a hub—but the wheel ranks right up here at the top with its combination of fragility and strength. If I looked those two objects separately, I cannot think they may work together. But Marcel Duchamp used the readymade way and multiple angles to achieve this goal, and Duchamp even said to have enjoyed spinning his stool-mounted wheel and its widely quoted as saying: I enjoyed looking at it, just as I enjoy looking at the flames dancing in a fireplace. As Brain said in lecture, the readymades include different types of works: Assisted Readymade and Rectified Readymades. The readymades are experiments in provocation, the products of a conscious effort to break every rule of the artistic tradition, in order to create a new kind of art — one that engages the mind instead of the eye, in ways that provoke the observer to participate and think. Assisted readymades were constructed of two or more objects. Some were simple, like Bicycle Wheel, which was made by joining two prefabricated objects. Another iconic duplication is the different style of Mona Lisa. This is really a funny one. In this work, I can see Simpson, Mr. Bean, Paris Hilton and etc. When I saw these pictures, I really admire the creativities of authors and understand that why Brain said : ‘idea behind the object considered more important than the object itself.’ In the end, the Brain summarized the notion of multiple: mass fabrication, readymades, industrial processes used to make original pieces, repetitive processed used to make original piece, original work that use repetitive action and original work that use repetition.

This week multimedia--Gabriel Orozco have the similar idea as Brain Gillis. Like his famous work—ping pong table, which is not just a piece of art, but yet a game that symbolically relates to Orozco’s belief that every game is an expression of how the universe works for different cultures. He used new way to make original pieces—ping pong table and lotus—together. Instead of a net, the table has been pulled apart and a raised pond (complete with lilly pads) put in its place, along with two more table sections making it a game for up to 4 players. He explained his inspirit in his video: ‘The Ping Pond Table is connected to this idea of a new space, a new possible space. When you have a normal ping pong game you have a net which is enough space between two spaces. But when you multiply that space by four, instead of two people playing you have four people playing in four tables. You open that space so the net is also open.’ From here we see that, he used the notion of multiply into space, not only the numbers. You can see the idea of multiples also in "La D.S." car, a silver DS that has been sliced into three pieces length wide, the middle section was removed and the two remaining pieces were reassembled as a one seater, and the result is an arrow-like car sculpture, with less width than its original. He recreated a work in new way and explained his lyricism and humorous, I found that his work is a continuous exploration, revealing a spirit of equal parts wit and amazement, open to surprise. In his art work, like ‘supermarket’, Gabriel took the idea of a mass produced object and modified it, using the notion of multiple to create new works.

Justin Novak is another artist whom is well equipped to use multiples in order to describe his creativity. Among his work, ‘Confessional Sinks’ made a deep impression on me. Justin used the original Kohler sink that is easy find in our daily life, producing confessional by adding latticed ceramic panels on the both sides that have a quatrefoil pattern. Through this work, the sinks were transformed into sites of spiritual as well as physical cleansing. The integration of this ritual of atonement into a domestic object suggested a private reckoning with one’s past deeds rather than a reliance on religious institutions. It’s worth mentioning that Justin was a student at the university of Oregon and Tyrras would be his GTF, it’s really interesting one~hahaha~!

The last thing we did in our class was watch the video of JR. I found this guy is the most moving and touching out of the entire artists we studied. He took the idea of multiples to a whole new level.  He used the art of photography and used it to spread a message around the world. By giving people the opportunity to share their stories and have people to learn about it, he is changing the world.  It may not be a drastic change, but he is slowly inspiring people to open up and not be afraid to share their thoughts.  

Mar­cel Ducham gave me this idea for an image when he used into Fountain to show that even though the picture is distorted in a certain way, you still know its function. It is a work of art that tran­scends a form, but that is also intel­li­gi­ble, an object that strikes down an idea while allow­ing it to spring up stronger.

Finally, I really want to give my thanks to Tyrras~Thanks for the patience, knowledge and humorous, as foreign students, I really realize the charming from American professor~~thkssss!

Flex Credit--Chris Jordan

            During the Chris Jordan’s exhibition, I went to the Jordan Schnitzer Museum three times to watch his show. Before I visited his exhibition I never heard him before (please forgive my shallow~~), thereby, I searched his information online to help me to beginning knowing about him.

            Chris Jordan is an artist based in Seattle, Washington who is best known for his large scale works depicting mass consumption and waste, particularly garbage. He has been called "the 'it' artist of the green movement". With these preliminary understanding, I visited his exhibition at first time. Like most art exhibition, the entire layout of Chris Jordan’s art exhibition is simple and clean, the only difference is that the light in here is darker and softer than other exhibitions. And then I found the sign which write that: 75% energy saving, that’s how much the JSMA is projected to save   traditional halogen lighting.’ Applying the environmental protection concept to the subtle details, which is the first highlight I found in Jordan’s exhibition. I watched every pieces and comments in this exhibition carefully, when I stared every work, I tried my best to reached a realm that not only just looking, but also to understand the author’s soul.

            Among Chris Jordan’s work, there are some pieces left a deep impression on me.

The first one is named ‘Light Bulbs’, the note is that ‘Depicts 320,000 light bulbs, equal to the number of kilowatt hours of electricity wasted in the United States every minute from inefficient residential electricity usage’. Jordan’s work is a frightening wake-up call that is based on waste, consumerism, planned obsolescence and the ravages to our environment.The work consists of large, detailed prints put together by using thousands of tiny photographs. The importance of the individual among the collective is made visually clear, and the sheer overwhelming nature of these problems cannot be escaped.

The other piece ‘Barbie Dolls’ which attracted me deeply, I think almost every girl liked Barbie Dolls in their childhood, thereby, I can grasp that feeling quickly. At the beginning, I was just attracted by the millions of pretty Barbie dolls, the orange background and countless Barbie dolls were composed of the numerous flowers, everything in this piece looked normal and good. But when I read the note and went home to search it on the internet, I found it was talking about ‘the number of electric breast augmentation surgeries performed monthly in the United Stated’. These plastic, large breasted, out of proportion dolls create unrealistic images in children's minds of a woman's body. Yet media advertising, television and Hollywood would reinforce her message, influencing what would become the American ideal of beauty. With more and more women pursuing the beauty, Chris Jordan made his own comments about this phenomenon in his work, which is how this doll has affected American women’s body images.

At second times, when I watched again his exhibition. I found the joint point among these 20 pieces—every piece is composed by the same small elements which constitute the overall theme. Let’s move our topic here to a wider theme, it can be given an example that-- ‘Skull With Cigarette’, which is an interesting piece in his exhibition. This skull gave me a fashion sense when I looked from a distance, it looks like the posters of Alexander Mcqueen~~But when I walked nearer the wall, I found an interesting thing that the whole skull is made up by millions of cigarette brands, like Winston, American Spirit and etc.—they all are the common brands. Chris Jordan wanted to approve that 200,000 packs of cigarettes equal to the number of Americans who die from cigarette smoking every six months. Among his 20 works in this show, at first glance, they all are the ordinary pictures, but when you enlarge these pictures, you will see this figure is made up of thousands of airplanes, dollar bills, barrels, beverage bottles and etc. Chris Jordan used daily necessities to wake up the public’s environmental awareness and want to visualize the massive consumption products in our daily life. It’s worth mentioning that each image depicts a specific amount: 1.5 billion Office paper (amount of paper used every five minutes), 106,000 aluminum cans (aluminum can consumption of every 30 seconds). Chris Jordan hopes will bring the number of these images represent the original data more intense shock effect, because we see the raw data is abstracted in the newspaper every day and make us numb, it is difficult to think of statistical data on the true meaning of our lives.

When I came to the Museum at third time, I sit down quietly, listening to the introduction on the phone and tasting the spirit he would bring to us. This exhibition through the intricate visual to look at our huge and strange society, Chris Jordan used the comparison of far and near, more and less to explain everything. When I looked again these pictures, I can’t help but think of some questions: how consumerism leads to waste and ecological destruction, how deadly habits like smoking really are, how an idealized body image drives the plastic surgery industry and in an increasingly large, strongly changing society, what is our role and responsibilities? When I was deeply impacted by these ideas, I don’t know how to answer these questions in-depth thought, maybe we should drink less beverage, save paper in every time, reduce the frequency of travelling by plane and do not pursue trend to change new style phones often. From the small details in our daily life, starting to change bit by bit, enhancing our environmental awareness and correcting the incorrect behavior. After this exhibition, I have to say that Chris Jordan used special to describe the phenomenon of American consumerism, we really should pay more attention about this.

This i s one of Chris Jordan's famous work.

On Midway Atoll, a remote cluster of islands more than 2000 miles from the nearest continent, the detritus of our mass consumption surfaces in an astonishing place: inside the stomachs of thousands of dead baby albatrosses. The nesting chicks are fed lethal quantities of plastic by their parents, who mistake the floating trash for food as they forage over the vast polluted Pacific Ocean.

Not Just Looking

  This week when I after listened to Amanda Wojick’s lecture, I have a new understanding about sculptors. Honestly, the reason why I like her lecture because that the work she showed in the class are really amazing and cool, not like the sculptors in the past. And she has her own special though about these fantastic works, thereby, her lecture attracted me most. What is sculpture? Amanda said that ‘with impressive continuity it testifies to man’s evolving sense of reality, and fulfills the recessity to express what cannot be verbalized’.

 Amanda informed us two themes, the first one is the use of abstraction, the distance between abstraction and representation, and the second one is the use of/approach to materials. She tried to explain that a work is abstraction when it is based on something real. Representational art is the thing that the artist is trying to depict where abstraction is inspired by nature and has no identifiable point. The first sculptor group piece she showed in class is named ‘9 women sculpture’. I found an interesting that most of these female artists worked with different material, they few like to work with one material at all. This character is fit the second themes which Amanda said. Among these sculptors, the one which leave a deep impression on me is ‘Arch of Hysteria’ made by Louise Bourgeois. I was shocked by this piece. Because a paralyzed body is arching their back as far back as possible, it’s truth to say that this behavior should be looked at helpless and immobile. But the feeling which I had is powerful, really powerful. I can’t reached the distance between abstraction and representation from this piece, but this little golden body contains an enormous amount of energy, it seemed like that if arch a little bit more, it will be hysteria. From an unprofessional point, I can feel a perfect interpretation of the name of sculpture, it can be considered successful~~In fact, in Louise Bourgeois’ work, I can see the delicate soft side in women’s heart.

But from Richard Serra’s work, I think his perspective is more from men’s view. Among a lot of his abstracted work, one made a deep impression on me is ‘Snake’. It was constructed by three pieces of weatherproof steels. At first look, when I saw this piece, I just saw three weatherproof steels. But when I saw the name, I tried to use my imagination to think it as snakes. It suddenly gave me more feeling. If I walked through the steel, it will be similar like to walk through the snakes because of the sharp of steel. It’s really amazing feeling! Like the author of this piece—Richard Serra said ‘You get involved with what effect the work has physically on your body as you walk.’ Thereby, the imaginations of viewer are this piece physical effect and it’s important to evaluate the value of artworks which from the audiences.

    With the same spirit is this week's reading—Just Looking by James Elkins from ‘The Object Stares Back’. One main point that James makes is that we are all hunters when it comes to our site. He explained it like that we are just looking for everything and instead of hunting for the things what we actually looking for. Like when I watched the sculpture work the professor showed in class, at first look, I always think that: wow, it’s shinning, or it’s strange piece~My eyes would always stop at the surface of the work at first look, and there is no real in-depth knowledge to feel works. But like he stated, “ In thinking about these things, it is important not to become too enraptured with the idea that seeing is desire, because it tends to split seeing into the ordinary occurrences of life, when we behave as if seeing could be disinterested and passionless, and the reflective moments, when we become archaeologists of our desires.” Like when you went shopping, you said you like this clothes. But why? You must think it in psychology space and physical space, and then you may find the real reason why you like this piece. Moving to a wider theme, the connection between the theme of James and this week lecture is like the connection between looking sculpture in the physical space and viewing it on the screen. After Tyrras guided us to leave the lecture and view a piece on campus, I have a different feeling I never had before. This experience was special and interesting to know that the sculpture as an actual and touched physical thing instead of just an abstract image on a screen. Like the sculpture before Lilis Hall, I passed here everyday, but I never stop and watched it. When I looked it carefully today, I think that like Tyrras said it like a window which is same as my first opinion. And then I found that this big windows was made up by millions of small aluminium, only one end of them was fixed, the other end can keep swinging when wind passed. Listening to it carefully, I can hear some fantastic sound like the wind chimes. Then, suddenly, I felt the world around me become colorful. I think this is a magic of enjoying sculpture in the physical space. Tyrras said something which shocked me yesterday. She mentioned that she thought looking was a passive process, that it was just something that you do. We think, we feel, we understand…so many things are thought, felt, and reacted to when looking.  Elkins described looking as hunting, it is really a kind of hunting!

This art work is from Antony Gormley. His best known works include the is this piece 'Angel of the North'.It is a steel sculpture of an angel, with wings. The wings themselves are not planar, but are angled 3.5º forward, which Gormley used to create "a sense of embrace". Aftet I saw it in the psychology space, I think that :I sometimes look a hole bored in the room, nothing happens, but gradually there is sunshine, come in through the window as, and then the dark corner of the room, will suddenly be sunshine, renders the Golden brilliant luster ... Meeting during that time I thought, no matter how boring life, will also have a certain corner, one in the morning, was illuminated by love ...